Fighting the spread of COVID-19 with vigilant floor hygiene

As we face the uncertainty and impact brought about by the Coronavirus (COVID-19), we urge you to stay informed. Cleaning and maintenance protocol is often a concern and difficult to enforce. Now, more than ever, it is critical to ensure you have implemented the most effective cleaning regimes.

Limiting early transmission of COVID-19 is key to limiting the spread of the virus.

The study mentioned below gives some useful insight into managing COVID-19¹.

Viral shedding refers to the release of infectious viral particles from someone who is currently carrying the virus. It is the means by which the virus spreads from person to person. At present, evidence suggests that COVID-19 sheds differently to the SARs or MERs viruses. With SARs and MERs, peak shedding only occurred later in the illness when that virus had moved deeper into the lungs. But early evidence suggests that COVID-19 sheds from the earliest point in the illness, when people may still have very mild (or no) symptoms and are still going about their daily routines. It appears that in most cases, viral shedding then drops after about day 5 of the illness, unless the illness gets progressively worse.¹

Viral shedding like that displayed by COVID 19, from the upper airway early in the illness, makes it very hard to contain. As a result, a serious and important onus rests on healthcare, education, retail and commercial environments to implement strict infection control regimes, wherever possible, to help prevent the spread of the virus.¹

COVID -19 appears to be able to spread in 3 ways:

• Airborne
• Touching a surface contaminated with the virus
• Person to person contact
  
  

A small study published last week noted that if infection control is poor, COVID-19 can survive for:

• up to 3 hours in the air
• up to 4 hours on copper
• up to 24 hours on cardboard
• up to 2-3 days on plastic and stainless steel.

We offer some information and advice on infection control regimes on vinyl floors:

Remember disinfecting is DIFFERENT to cleaning

It is critical to remember that cleaning and disinfecting are two entirely different processes and should be treated as such in effective infection control.

Cleaning removes germs, dirt, and impurities from surfaces or objects. Cleaning works by using soap (or detergent) and water to physically remove germs from surfaces. This process does not necessarily kill germs, but by removing them, it lowers their numbers and the risk of spreading infection.

Disinfecting kills germs on surfaces or objects. Disinfecting works by using chemicals to kill germs on surfaces or objects. This process does not necessarily clean dirty surfaces or remove germs, but by killing germs on a surface after cleaning, it can further lower the risk of spreading infection.

Both processes play an important role and a good infection control regime should always clean and disinfect surfaces separately.

How a PUR-coated vinyl floor covering can improve infection control³

• PUR vinyl can easily withstand an increased frequency of infection control cleaning.
• The PUR reinforcement in the floors is cross-linked and UV cured for superior cleaning benefits.
• The lack of joins or grooves reduce the areas where germs can hide and multiply.
  
  

The types of cleaning routines that work best on vinyl floors³

• Chlorine-based products that disinfect can be used on Polyflor vinyl floor coverings provided the area is rinsed after use and diluted as per manufacturer’s instructions.
• Products containing pine gel and phenolic disinfectants should not be used on Polyflor vinyl floorings as they may damage the floor covering.
• The use of robot-like devices, dispersing hydrogen peroxide vapour across floors and walls to improve strict infection control practices poses a very low risk to in-situ vinyl flooring and wall cladding.
• With regards to the most suitable-for-use disinfectant for COVID-19 please confirm with your regular cleaning and disinfectant product supplier or contact marketing@polyflor.co.za
• To further encourage hygiene compliance, alcohol-based hand gels are being increasingly used alongside an effective cleaning regime as part of infection control programmes. Polyflor homogeneous PUR, heterogeneous PUR and Polysafe PUR flooring ranges are compatible for use with the most commonly used alco-based hand gels. Some alco-hand gels contain a high concentration of ethanol and to discuss their compatibility with other Polyflor floor coverings email marketing@polyflor.co.za
  
  

Infection control has also been carefully considered in our Gradus wall protection range.  SureProtect Pure adheres to strict infection prevention and control guidelines and has the quality and design finishes and fittings that enable thorough access, cleaning and maintenance to take place. 

For any help or information on maintaining or implementing effective disinfection routines on the Polyflor range, please contact marketing@polyflor.co.za or Blythe on 011 609 3500.

For more flooring tips and tricks, and expert advice on how to maintain and clean your vinyl floors, subscribe to our Polyflor Insights. References:

1. Woelfel, Roman, et al. Clinical Presentation and Virological Assessment of Hospitalized Cases of Coronavirus Disease 2019 in a Travel-Associated Transmission Cluster. preprint, Infectious Diseases (except HIV/AIDS), 8 Mar. 2020. DOI.org (Crossref), doi:10.1101/2020.03.05.20030502. Available at https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.05.20030502v1. Accessed 13 March 2020.

2. Van Doremanalen et al., March 2020. Aerosol and surface stability of HCoV-19 (SARS-CoV-2) compared to SARS-CoV-1 Available at https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.09.20033217v1.full.pdf. Accessed 16 March 2020

3. Polyflor UK Healthcare brochure 2017. Available at https://www.polyflor.com/jh/web.nsf/brochures/DC374C9D5C1AB51F802579C9003E7196/$file/Healthcare_Brochure_2017.pdf. Accessed 15 March 2020.